Details
by Higurazel
Summary: Bondageshipping  Ryuji Otogi x Yami no Malik , AU, Violence. Detective Otogi is on the trail of a killer, and all the evidence points to an impossible conclusion.
1. Chapter 1

_**DOMINO HARBOUR DISTRICT**_

_**FEBRUARY 1st**_

_**08:54 a.m.**_

The tang of blood rose up from the floor, saturating the air, tainting every inhalation with its coppery bouquet. Tacky and thick, it attempted to dry as it crawled over the iron plates that made up the floor of this warehouse, deep crimson at the edges turning black towards the centre of the room. The clattering of a hundred thousand raindrops furiously pounding the tin roof almost seemed to drown out the low drone of hushed conversations - Scene of Crime Officers searching through the debris, sliding small items into evidence bags, swapping theories about what had happened. High above, an empty metal harness drifted in the breeze, chains gently sliding along one another, calm, serene, all traces of the body it once held now gone.

I scrawled notes into my small leather book at a possessed speed, brow knit tight as I mouthed each word that I wrote. I shifted my weight, feeling the unfamiliar, unwelcome weight of the folio in my satchel, filled with photographs of the victim as she'd been found. My grip on the pencil tightened and I sucked in a long, forceful breath. I tried to dispel the mental images of the girl, dangling from the harness, skin stripped away from her neck downwards, face purple and contorted, as though she'd choked. One bloody hand print plastered over her face, fingers pressed tight to her skin. Someone had wanted to make _very _sure that their fingerprints were easy to find.

It fit. Just like the other three victims. All young women. All ritually flayed out in the middle of nowhere, suspended in an iron harness, hooked in. The killer had taken his time with all of them, taking it slowly. The girls had all been found roughly a week apart. My mind centred on that red hand print. So why that? Why now? Why the overconfidence? Did the gesture have some symbolic meaning?

"Detective Otogi," the young, nasal voice brought me back to the real world. A junior technician, holding a clipboard. "Detective Otogi, there's a call for you in the van."

"I'll be right there," I told him, pressing the pencil into my breast pocket and dropping the notebook into my satchel. I made my way to the yellow tape that cordoned off the area, ducking underneath and starting across the road to the van. Even though I lifted my jacket over my head, the rain still managed to get through. Despite the journey taking no more than a handful of seconds, I was soaked by the time I reached the sliding door of the vehicle. I piled inside, just as a titanic rumble of thunder coursed overhead. Inside I shook my head, droplets of water cascading from my long, dark strands of hair.

Damn I'd need to get it cut again soon.

I picked up the phone and hit the flashing red button.

"Otogi," I announced.

"Ryu, It's Rebbecca."

I paused. Something was wrong. I'd made a request for forensics to process the handprint. In fact I'd specifically asked for Rebecca to handle it. Her quick thinking had helped out in the past, and despite her apparent lack of experience, she was something of a child prodigy. I'd told them to make it priority number one. But even so, that had been only an hour ago. There was no way they could have anything concrete this quickly.

"Hello?"

I realised I'd paused a little too long.

"Yes, yes Rebbecca I'm here. You've... found something?"

"Oh I've found something alright," She sounded excited, incredulous even. "Get up here, quickly. This is the sort of thing you'll have to see to believe."

_**DOMINO CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT**_

_**FORENSICS LABORATORY 3**_

_**FEBRUARY 1st**_

_**09:30 a.m.**_

I rested my head in my hands, alternately staring from the printed photographs on the desk in front of me, to the computer screen directly ahead, to Rebecca's smiling, triumphant face.

"This has to be a mistake." I told her, only somewhat oblivious to how hurt she looked by the comment.

"I've double, triple and quadruple checked Ryu," She told me, irritatingly informal. "By computer and by eye."

"But it's impossible." I told her, finally lifting my head and glaring at the computer screen. "There is no way in hell that those fingerprints could belong to Malik Ishtar."

"I didn't think so either, but it's not just the handprint."

"What do you mean?"

"The blood that the imprint was left in, it wasn't the victim's. DNA analysis confirms that it belonged to Malik Ishtar. He placed a hand print there in his own blood."

"There's got to be some mistake." I picked up the top sheet of paper. A hazy black and white photograph of Malik from two years ago. Back when I had been tailing him.

"Not even a chance," Rebbecca retorted. She was clearly starting to lose her temper. "You know better than anyone how much material we have from the Ishtar case. We've got perfect prints, DNA samples, everything. Ever since..."

My hand clenched the sheet, creasing lines through Malik's face. "Go on. Say it."

"Ever since the incident."

"The incident?" My knee was jumping, my teeth grinding. "Go ahead and say it."

"Eighteen months ago, when Malik Ishtar was cornered on the roof of the Kaiba Corp building and-"

"And shot by Detective Ryuji Otogi before he could carry out his plan of assassinating Captain Mutou." I finished for her.

A long, uncomfortable silence dominated the room. Neither of us even looked at the other.

"I put a bullet in Malik Ishtar's head." I stated, measuring my breaths. I got to my feet. "I watched him go down. I saw him lying there in the morgue. Malik Ishtar is not the man we're looking for. He's dead." I picked up my coat and started for the door.

"So where are you going?" Rebbecca shouted after me.

"To talk to the only other person who might have access to Malik's blood and fingerprints."

_**WEST DOMINO HEIGHTS**_

_**FEBRUARY 1st**_

_**11:30 a.m.**_

I drummed my feet against the carpeted floor as I waited in the lobby. It was a vast room, high red walls speeding to a domed ceiling, suspending a chandelier that gently swayed.

_Drifting in the breeze._

_Like the chains in a butcher's harness._

I shook my head to dispel the thoughts. The secretary at the desk to my left gave me an odd look, but turned her attention back to her computer screen before I could allay her worries with patented Otogi charm. Truth be told, I didn't feel much up to charming anyone. My gaze danced around the lobby.

The elevator doors. Black. Marble. Pretentious.

Pillars along the length of the room, painted the same deep red as the walls.

Intermittent pedestals lining the far wall, each displaying a piece of blackened, ruined pottery. Egyptian hieroglyphs pierced through the darkness and filth that encrusted their surfaces, etched in gold. My host had clearly taken a lot of trouble to clean only the hieroglyphs, leaving the larger portion of the exhibits to decay.

Directly ahead of me, a painting. It jarred with the rest of the decorations. Very modern.

Whoever had painted it was a master of structuring their work. It had been composed in such a way that the viewer took in every detail from the outside in. The eye spiralling into the centre of the canvas, taking in each facet of the work as it travelled.

At the furthest extreme, the very bottom left corner of the painting - The initials R.B.

In the foreground of the painting, a café. It was a slightly muted place, with colours all shaded and smudged. Deep reds, browns and blacks flowing together at the edges. A waiter strode from one table to another, holding a pot of tea in one towel-clad hand. The café was packed. It looked like a lunch time rush. Every head at every table was pointed away from the viewer. To a seated couple next to the window.

There was nothing out of the ordinary about the couple, a young-looking man and woman in smart clothing. A pair of glasses sat on the table between them, one half full of something light and frothy, the other completely drained. The couple were also facing away from the viewer. I realised that ever one of the café's occupants were in fact staring out of the window.

A black taxi sat straddling the curb at an odd angle, facing slightly into the street, its rear swerved out towards the centre of the road. The front bumper nearest the café window had a slight dent in it. Fresh. Broken glass from the headlight littered the ground in front of the car.

Further into the centre of the painting, a crowd of people were huddled together, all facing inwards. All of them staring at something on the ground. None of them looking particularly bothered to move. Content to sit and stare for eternity.

Just to the side of them, almost as an afterthought, lay the centre point of the painting.

A black baby carriage. Crumpled. Crushed. Mangled wheels facing toward the café window. Frozen in the moment of the painting. No sound. No crying infant. Silence. Complete and utter-

"Detective Otogi?" The secretary's voice almost shocked me to my feet. I just about managed to keep control, turning to her.

"You can go on through now." She told me, waving her arm towards the double doors next to her. They started to swing open, the engraving on them disappearing as they spread apart. A strange, dream-catcher like object, with a single staring eye at its centre.

_**BAKURA'S OFFICE**_

_**12:01 p.m.**_

"It's certainly an unexpected visit," Bakura said, not bothering with a formal greeting. We both knew the score here. Bakura was a con artist, a thief, a psychopath and, quite possibly, a murderer too. Nothing could ever be pinned on him though. He was always three steps ahead. Three steps ahead, and occasionally playing a whole different game to boot. In any case, he knew that if the police were calling on him, it wasn't just to shoot the shit and ask how business was. At the moment it seemed that business was art dealing. From the suit, the office and the rest of the building, it seemed to be going well for him. "I won't insult us both by pretending it's a pleasant surprise." He added, slowly rolling back on his high, leather office chair, away from the enormous oak desk that separated us.

"Trust me Bakura, I want to be here even less than you want me-" I started

"And yet... Here you are." Bakura clasped his hands, smiling that small, cruel, feline smile he usually carried.

"Here I am." I echoed, opening my satchel. "This is about the homicides that have been taking place over the last few weeks. I was wondering if-"

"10th of January," He said, cutting me off. Again. "I was out of the country on business. 16th of January, I was dining with friends. 24th January, overseeing an installation at the museum."

"You've memorised your alibis?" I paused, my hand half into my satchel.

"Well, I did figure it would be only a matter of time until someone came calling about it." He sighed, drumming his fingers over the desk. "It seems no matter how many times your people hear my innocence declared in court, you always turn up once something particularly gruesome happens. Always the first port of call. I suppose I should be flattered. I probably would be if I weren't such a busy man."

"You don't think just listing off your alibis like that, without request, is a little suspect?"

"My dear detective," Bakura's smile became a full-fledged grin. "I'm already a _little suspect_, am I not? I thought I would save us both time by getting this sorted out as speedily as possible. Now, would you like to move directly on to the thinly veiled jokes about my sex life? Or shall we just skip over that... _riveting _part of our duel of wits?"

"Actually, I had a few questions. I thought you could be of some assistance. You are, for once, not a suspect. Not officially anyway."

"I'm not?" It almost looked as though Bakura's silver hair bristled with indignation. I could see bitterness swell behind his eyes. He wasn't the centre of attention on this little venture. As much as he complained about it, he looked the visits from the police. Liked taunting us. Living dangerously. He recovered quickly, clearing his throat. "Well, you perhaps should have mentioned that before I offered my alibi."

It was my turn to grin. "And rob you of a little spotlight? I wouldn't dare. Now..." I pulled out my notebook and pencil. "How much do you know about the homicides?"

"Very little, I must admit." Bakura shrugged. "All the newspapers say is that they're particularly brutal killings. Young women. Ritualised. Other than that... Well, I keep my nose out of it. Terrible business."

I scrawled down notes. "Ok. Do you know anyone that may have an interest in ritual killings? For an example, let's say: Flaying."

"Detective Otogi, I'm not entirely sure I follow. The company that I keep don't really bother themselves with things like... that. And if they do, well, they don't talk about it at the exhibitions."

"But you've socialised with someone that fits the bill before."

The same bristling over Bakura's hair. His eyes narrowed. "I beg your pardon?"

"Malik Ishtar. Your former partner in crime. If memory serves, he had a history of abuse as a child, including ritual mutilation. Is that right?"

"Quite what my former business partner has to do with this I can only struggle to imagine." Bakura looked angry now, offended even. "But surely any link he might have would be made null and void due to his... How should I say... Incapacitation?" His fingers were no longer drumming on the desk, instead curled into tight fists.

"But you were more than just business partners, correct?" I had to gauge this right. If I pushed too far, Bakura would go off the deep end and I'd get nowhere. If I didn't push far enough, he'd take control of the situation and lead me on a merry dance, with no helpful information.

"Rumours do certainly fly don't they Detective?" Bakura answered, carefully. I could almost see him mentally counting to ten.

"Indeed they do." I pondered my next move. How much of my hand should I reveal? "Do you visit his grave often?"

"Whether or not I do isn't any of your damn business." He snapped, fist smashing into the top of the desk. "What has this got to do with anything?"

"Everything," I told him. "Malik's fingerprints were found at the scene of the latest murder. Along with a lot of his blood."

"But that's impossible," Bakura roared. He looked about ready to leap the desk and attack me.

The change in his face was gradual and disquieting to watch. The rage slowly melted away, leaving behind a look of puzzlement as he fought to process this new information. Clearly he was just as confused as I was by the impossibility of it all. Then it shifted again. Realisation dawned over him. Somewhere within the corners of his twisted mind, a penny dropped. The look of abject horror that took over him left me feeling physically sick with worry.

"Impossible." He repeated. His voice was quiet, eyes unfocused.

"Not necessarily." I told him, trying to keep the upper hand. "See, I had some time to think on the way over here. To plant evidence like this at the crime scene, all someone would need would be one of Malik's hands and some of his blood. To get that, you'd need to be Grade A Bat-shit _and _have a penchant for grave-robbing."

Bakura's laughter was outright terrifying. A high-pitched giggle. Panicked. Delirious. He was barely even listening to what I was saying.

"That's an interesting theory Detective," He told me, his face getting rapidly paler. "Except for two things. One: I can guarantee that if you were to examine Malik's gravesite, you will find it completely undisturbed."

"You can be sure of that?" I asked, eyebrow arched.

"Well..." He trailed off, "If it has been disturbed, I certainly haven't noticed. And I go by there every few days. If someone got in there, they're a better graverobber than me."

"It's possible."

"No," He chuckled humourlessly, "No it isn't."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm the best."

In retrospect, I probably should have acted more on Bakura's outright confession to a Detective that he was indeed a grave-robber. Instead I started sliding my notebook back into the satchel.

"And the second thing?" I asked.

"Again, just guesswork." Bakura was out of his chair, pacing back and forth. "But if my suspicions are right, that blood found at the crime-scene will be fresh. If someone planed it there, they would have needed to store it. My guess is it came straight from a wound. Probably self-inflicted at that."

"And how exactly are you putting this together?"

"Are you much of a poetry man?" He asked me, eyes hazy and drifting over the window behind his desk.

"I don't have time for this Bakura."

"Pablo Neruda wrote a poem called "I explain a few things", after his experiences in the Spanish Civil War. It included a brief description of the senseless killings spilling over and claiming the lives of children." He closed his eyes, his back to me.

"_Y por las calles la sangre de los niños_

_corría simplemente, como sangre de niños_."

There was a long pause. I started to get out of my seat. Perhaps I had pushed too far.

"_And down the streets ran the blood of children._

_Simply ran, like the blood of children._"

He turned back towards me. He'd bitten through his lower lip, a red streak coursing down his chin, eyes wild. "Sometimes, Detective, you have to look at things without flowery similes. Sometimes you just have to look at something as cold, hard and true. No matter how ugly or difficult it is to accept."

_**MY APARTMENT**_

_**FEBRUARY 2nd**_

_**12:58 a.m**_

I couldn't sleep.

That in itself wasn't much of a surprise. I'd been taking as much coffee as I could today to stay on the cutting edge. Now I was paying for it. My entire body felt exhausted, muscles crying out for some relaxation. My mind raced at a billion miles an hour though, refusing to let me rest.

I lifted my protesting arm, looking at the small, bone-coloured die between my thumb and forefinger, turning it over and over slowly. My lucky die. Or at least, maybe it was. Long ago I'd had the idea of making all of my dice "The lucky one". It hadn't helped with the gambling. If anything I lost more often now. I swore at the die in my hand.

"You say something?" Came the voice from the bathroom. Shizuuka. Sergeant Katsuya's sister. It felt good to have someone here. After a day like today, the last thing I wanted was to be alone.

"Just talking to myself," I sighed. I placed the die on the bedside table, next to the lamp. With a quick flick, I plunged the room into darkness, attempting to sleep while the sounds of Shizuuka showering lulled me away.

_**DOMINO CITY CENTRAL CEMETERY**_

_**FEBRUARY 2nd**_

_**01:46 p.m.**_

"Are you sure this is necessary Detective?" It was the same technician from yesterday. He looked even more on edge today. Granted that could be due to what I was putting him and his ilk through right now. The heavy machinery tore up the ground, scooping it forwards, making sure not to deposit it on any of the other resting places. Malik Ishtar's tombstone loomed over the open pit, angled forwards slightly, as if it too were just dying to know what was down there.

"Absolutely." I said, rubbing my gloved hands together. Colder today. Another early rain had cooled the city. There'd probably be snow before the week was up.

"But we got a probe right through to the coffin earlier." The technician protested, "This earth hasn't been disturbed since Ishtar's burial." He was shouting to be heard over the rumble of the machinery.

"Listen," I shouted back to him. "You know all those movies where the detective ignores his gut instinct because a junior technician tells him to?"

"Yeah?" He answered without thinking.

"No you don't." I said. The machinery subsided. We'd reached the coffin. "They don't fucking exist." I poked him in the forehead, grinning as I charged towards the open grave. A crane hoisted the wooden box to the surface. A wooden box. That's all it was to me now. To think of it as anything else would be to walk down a long, uncomfortable road.

I made sure I was right next to blackened oblong when the crew moved to open it.

"Let her rip boys."

The rotten lid tore straight off.

_**WEST DOMINO HEIGHTS**_

_**FEBRUARY 2nd**_

_**02:32 p.m.**_

I marched out of the elevator doors, Bakura's office fixed plain in my sight. I was full of bravado, ready to shout down a protesting secretary.

She wasn't there.

Even better.

The two armed officers either side of me kept pace as I approached the door. I slowed, pressing my ear to the door. I could hear tapping. Pen on paper? Footsteps? Fingers drumming on an oak desk?

"Knock knock Bakura," I whispered as I raised one boot and smashed it squarely in the centre of the doors, sending them screaming open.

I wasn't ready for this. One of the armed officers swore loudly.

A metal harness swung from the ceiling, a recently flayed woman hooked inside. Her face was the same dark purple as the others, twisted and contorted into utter agony. The tap-tap of blood falling, leaking into the carpet echoed.

"Son of a bitch!" I kicked thin air, "I had him right here!" One of the officers turned his head sharply.

"The elevator's on the move." He whispered. The three of us turned on the spot, facing the elevator across the lobby. The lights began blinking upwards. Someone was on their way up. Without a word, the two officers went to work, one kneeling behind the secretary's desk, propping a semi-automatic rifle on the marble surface. The other pressed himself behind a pillar, pistol drawn. I reached for my own pistol when I heard the rush of air from the girl's body. A gasp, a sigh, a sudden exhalation.

I turned, rushing to her side.

Dead. Still dead. Whatever I had heard had been some sort of post-mortem spasm. I was getting jumpy.

The faint chime of the elevator doors opening. I turned back to the lobby.

Nothing.

No Bakura. No armed officers. Just an empty lobby with an elevator door on the far side hanging open like some disgusting orifice.

"What happened?" I called out, expecting that the officer's had taken up better positions, somewhere out of my line of sight.

The blow from behind almost took my head clean off. I was unconscious before I hit the floor.

_**?**_

_**?**_

_**?**_

I came to in blinding pain.

A draught rushed over my body, sliding over my aching flesh. I was completely bared to the elements, the reassuring grip of my winter clothes replaced by a feeling of vulnerability and chill, a cold iron harness gripping me now. Tugging sensations along my back, my arms and legs, the searing pain of a score of hooks pierced through my skin. I was close to blacking out again. I heard footsteps behind me.

"You son of a bitch Bakura," I spat. The effort to speak made me dizzy. The back of my head still felt as though it had been completely caved in. "You really had me going."

The sound of metal scraping against stone. Someone picking something up off the floor. A quick, hot flash of pain as something sharp rushed up along my spine, expertly splitting the skin. I grit my teeth and contained my scream. I bucked about in the harness, eliciting a jingling of chains.

"What did you do with the rest of Malik's corpse?" I shouted, "You can't have lugged the whole thing around with you to plant that evidence. Why did you take the whole thing? Or..." I chuckled, hacking up a wad of blood-flecked spittle, "Or do I really not want to know."

The laugh was a choir of madness. Hitting every discordant note, bouncing off the walls that lay in the shadows beyond, ricocheting back. It almost hurt as much as the harness.

A warm, wet sensation at my neck, moving back and forth. A tongue, pressed against my skin. I couldn't turn to see him, but I could feel Bakura's hair brushing against my head as he moved.

"Hey, what the hell are you doing now?" The tongue receded, the lips remained, pursed over my trapezius. The teeth sank down and tore into my muscle, ripping a chunk of meat away before I had any idea what was happening. I couldn't hold back this scream. It came long and ragged, hot blood pouring down my chest from the bite wound. I thrashed about in the confines of the harness, but he remained, always a few inches away, face hovering just next to my ear. I could hear him chewing, groaning, swallowing.

The screams stopped, the pain didn't. I managed to keep myself from blacking out again, sucking in breath after breath, managing to raise my head. Just as he came around in front of me.

"Good to see you again Detective," Malik chuckled, licking dark blood from his lips. It couldn't be. No.

It was Malik.

It wasn't Malik.

He was too tall. His eyes deeper, darker. His chest and shoulders were broader. The facial tattoo's remained, but were now combined with a series of pulsing veins that coursed over his temples. At the centre of his forehead, a raised lump of flesh glowed golden in the shape of a stylised eye. I could feel the heat emanating from it. If this truly was Malik, he'd made some serious changes in the last year and a half. Besides somehow coming back from the dead.

"You," I managed weakly. "Not you."

"Oh yes, all me." He threw his arms wide. I caught sight of a dagger in his left hand. Heavy handle, keen edge. He was bare chested, a series of fresh cuts across his skin, curving in and out of one another like absent-minded doodles.

"How?" I could feel the oncoming rush of unconsciousness.

"Are you still a gambling man, Detective Otogi?" Malik let out that same cacophonous laugh. He dropped the dagger to the floor, capering off to the shadows where I couldn't track him. My eyes played across the darkness, trying to see where he would come from next. I shut them quickly. My mind's eye burned with the unwelcome image of collected skins, hanging in the black, stretched by hooks, Malik's hieroglyphs carved into them.

I passed out.

_**?**_

_**?**_

_**?**_

"Wakey wakey Detective Otogi," Malik's voice brought me back to accursed wakefulness. He stood ahead of me, now as naked as myself, with thick blood smeared over his torso. His tongue drooped from his lips, swaying from one side to the other past his chin as he grinned up at me. "You never did answer," He pouted. "I had to do some searching for myself. Looks like you are still a bit of a gambler." He chuckled, bringing one hand into view.

My lucky die.

"Fancy a game of chance, Detective?" His grin widened, threatening to engulf his entire face.

"What are you..." I couldn't form words anymore.

"Very simple. Very, very simple." His head was swaying from side to side, bobbing like a charmed snake. "Take a chance. Roll the dice. Roll odds, and you don't make it out of here. Roll evens though and..." He brought his other hand into view. The pistol that the armed officer had been carrying earlier. "You get to take a second chance at killing me. Come on. I'll make it easier this time. Don't want to make the same mistake twice hmm?"

"You're insane." I realised the sheer redundancy of my words even as they were spoken. Malik didn't call me on it, he just shrugged and pulled a pin out of the harness. My left arm swung free with a crack and a tsunami of pain. I groaned as every fibre of every muscle in my arm shrieked in unison. Malik pressed the die into my slick palm. He was half an inch from my face. I could see straight through his eyes into the absolute pit of sensless lunacy that lay beyond. He meant every word of this. There was one way out.

I looked down at my shaking hand. Gripping the die like a raft in a tumultuous ocean. It dropped from my hand almost by accident rather than effort, clattering against the stone floor. My eyes watched it bounce and spin over the ground, turning on itself, rebounding off a chunk of rusted metal. Every single part of me stopped as the die slowed, spinning on a corner, falling into place. Bouncing over itself.

5

2

3

I almost screamed at Malik to just get it over with. Right at the moment that the dice finally stopped.

6 looked up at me. Possibly the most beautiful number ever conceived.

"No!" Malik kicked the tiny die off into the shadows, his veins pulsing even more visibly now. He hoisted the pistol up, pushing it against my forehead, shoving my head back. "Do I get a do-over?" He asked, spitting into my eyes as he spoke.

"We had a deal Malik," My voice was drifting away piece by piece.

"You expect me to stand by such a one sided deal?"

"Yes."

"You must think I'm beyond crazy." He laughed. Even as he said it, he was turning the gun over and pressing the butt of it into my palm. "You do realise that if it didn't work the first time, there's no way it's going to work the next time around?" He sneered.

I lifted the pistol.

It weighed a thousand pounds.

Every ounce of effort I had left in me was put into pressing the gun to Malik's glowing forehead.

"It's worth a shot." I told him.

He began to laugh again. "Yes," He made out between chuckles, "Worth a shot. I see what you did th-"

I pulled the trigger.

*Click*

Malik's grin sobered. No longer pure, unadulterated insanity. It was now the focused, famished grin of a master sadist. He'd been playing me this whole time. The son of a bitch was crazy, that much was for sure, but-

"Crazy," Malik said, plucking the gun out of my feeble hand, "But not stupid."

He turned on the spot, picking up a long, thin, golden rod that had been lying on the ground behind him. At one end was a golden eye, with what looked like a pair of tiny wings flanking it. The other tip came to a point sharper than anything I'd ever seen before.

I prayed that I would fall back into unconsciousness before he started.


	2. Chapter 2

**EAST DOMINO**

**JANUARY 19****th**

**10:30 p.m.**

My legs finally give out, bones and tendons turning to a burning mess. With the earth concrete coming up to embrace me, I fight to raise my arms, to break my fall. Not an inch of movement. I crash to the ground, my face bouncing off the pavement, pain flaring through my nose, my chin, my forehead.

I'm not sure how long I lie there for. The metallic tang of blood filling my nostrils, eyes screwed tightly shut, mouth full of filth and grit. Soon enough I'm crawling. Dragging myself out of the streetlights and into the darkness between apartments. Out of the light. Soothing. Healing.

I must be near to my destination. Every ache in my ruined body, every ragged nerve and livid scar assures in sweet tones that I have to be close.

With more effort than I have ever had to muster in my life, I pull myself into a sitting position, back to a wall. I lift my head, feeling the blood that pours from my nose thickening and setting on my lips. I turn my head, revelling in each crack and pop from my neck.

It's there.

Across the street.

Shizuuka's place. Her ground floor apartment. A cascade of memories ran through my brain. So vivid I could feel the strain on the backs of my eyes. Everything from how she looked each time she answered the door to me, to the smell of the carpets, the warmth in the kitchen, the sensation of her bed sheets on bare flesh…

With a groan that erupts from every shred of my being, I lurch out of the alley, back into the hateful glare of the streetlamps. I dart across the road as fast as I can, my legs buckling with each stride, every ancient incision on my chest screeching in protest. I finally make it across, spilling myself against the side of the building and leaning against the wall. I use it to hold myself up, pathetically limping around until I can reach a window.

I need to see if she's still here.

How long have I been away?

Days?

Months?

I know it must be longer than that, but I can perhaps lie to myself. The torture simple made it seem as though that creature had me captive for much longer. Soon I would discover that I had only been away for a week before I managed my escape. I'm sure of it. As sure as I can allow myself to be.

I finally find a window and skulk nearer, raising myself just high enough to be able to sneak a look inside.

Lights on. Dim. Cosy. I strain my eyes to catch a sight of anyone in the room. A movement of shadow here and there. Whoever it is, they are much too large to be Shizuuka, I'm sure of that. Perhaps I have been away for too long. Maybe she has moved away. Moved on. Found a new place to live her life.

The figure inside moves to the centre of the room, arms stretched overhead.

I recognise him. A man I have seen many times before. Dealt with only rarely. Officer Hiroto Honda, one of the Domino City P.D.'s many patrolmen. Dependable, strong, good at his job. Never advanced far within the force, despite being close friends with both Detective Katsuya and Captain Mutou. It would be too much of a coincidence that he would be the apartment's new tenant. And that would mean-

She comes into view next, taking a step towards Honda, pressing herself close to him, head resting on his chest. Nostalgia, wonderful and poisonous, takes hold of me. Knowing that once that would have been me. Once not long ago. Lifetimes ago. I would give anything to exact my revenge on Malik right this second. Not for the torture, the humiliation, the fear. For the theft of time. For taking away even a minute of my life, keeping me locked deep in the earth.

I feel a tooth cracking, loosening in my jaw as my mouth clenches shut. My eyes drifting downward in the scene. Noting a problem the couple have. They cannot embrace as comfortably as I would have expected. An obstacle sitting directly between them. Shizuuka's swollen belly nestled safely. Her child… _Their_ child?

The smiling couple say something to one another, turning together, almost flowing out of the room as one being. The light goes out and I am staring into blackness. A void. Space. Cold and infinite.

How long?

I can feel my face tightening as tears try to force their way from my scarred face. Such effort that it feels like dust will rain from my eyes.

I know that now I should leave. I should crawl away. Where to? Does it matter? I could crawl back to the precinct, to get help, to a hospital. Hell, I could crawl back to Malik's feet right now. There would be nothing more he could to me. I know I should leave.

But my body is in motion. Fingers with severed tips pressing into the fault in the window frame that I remember from a hundred thousand years ago, pressing the latch up just the way I remember doing yesterday. A gentle push and the window lifts silently. I begged her to have this thing fixed. It wouldn't be safe for her. In this city. There are monsters out there.

I'm slipping my way into the building. Rough hands grip the ledge and drag my broken carcass inside. Into the warmth. Into the safety.

There are monsters out there.


End file.
